Astrophotography Workshop

Digital photography enables us to capture the beauty of the night sky in unprecedented detail. This astrophotography workshop will introduce students to the wide range of astronomical phenomena that can be photographed using an ordinary digital single lens reflex camera (without a telescope). A full explanation will be provided of techniques to make stunning images of stars, planets, the moon and the Milky Way, in conjunction with terrestrial landscapes. The course also covers photographing star trails as well as rare, elusive and fast-moving astronomical phenomena such as meteors, aurorae and eclipses. The course will be run at the excellent photography training facilities of Lacock Photography in Wiltshire.

Sufficient scientific detail will be included to enable course participants to understand the astronomical phenomena they can photograph and the extraordinary variety of scales of the Universe that can be recorded with an ordinary digital camera, ranging from ~100 km in the case of aurorae and meteors to 25 million million million km for the Andromeda galaxy.

An evening practical session photographing Lacock Abbey at night will enable students to put into practice what they have learned, with guidance in the field. If the sky is clear, photograph the Abbey with stars above. Course dates have been selected to optimise moonlight conditions.

To get the most out of the course students should already understand the basics of exposure, shutter speed, aperture and ISO; and be comfortable handling their cameras using manual exposure mode.